Communism's cave in either caused and was once speeded up through the long-anticipated reunification of Germany. What have been the political and social undercurrents that resulted in the abrupt cave in of East Germany? What difficulties have arisen due to the fact reunification? essentially, communism has left a cultural and political void that begs to be assessed.

Laurence McFalls the following deals a whole figuring out of communism's cave in, offering an evidence for the cultural conflicts and the identification obstacle that experience troubled Germany considering reunification. checking out the validity of the typical theories of japanese ecu cave in, the paintings criticizes those systemic factors of East Germany's dying for failing take into consideration the motivations of standard voters who, McFalls asserts, eventually toppled the regime. to respond to the query who overthrew Honecker?, McFalls has interviewed over two hundred East Germans, selecting the first gamers who led to the East German revolution of 1989.

In his in-depth exam of the bogus German kingdom, McFalls exposes the old, financial, social, and political legacy of communism. hard and provocative, Communism's cave in, Democracy's Demise? should be of curiosity to a extensive scope of students of sociology, historians, political philosophers, and political scientiests.

Socialism Unbound, through Stephen Bronner, used to be broadly acclaimed while it first seemed in 1990. This moment revised version brings it brand new. Written in a transparent prose, and an uncompromising demeanour, it bargains new serious reflections at the culture of operating classification politics and its salience for the hot millennium.

During this terrific paintings, first released in 1936, Sydney Hook seeks to solve one of many vintage difficulties of eu highbrow historical past: how the political radicalism and philosophical materialism of Karl Marx issued from the magical and conservative highbrow approach of G. W. F. Hegel. This version encompasses a ahead through Christopher Phelps discussing Hook's occupation and the importance of From Hegel to Marx within the historical past of rules.

“This booklet is impressive, incisive, sincere and merits to be learn with consciousness. it's an incredible occasion within the Marxist theoretical creation. ” —Politique Hebdo“A striking essay, whose advantage is not just theoretical, but additionally old, since it examines unknown points of the evolution of younger Marx’s considering.

This publication rejects the widely encountered conception of Friedrich Engels as perpetuator of a "tragic deception" of Marx, and the both chronic physique of opinion treating him as "his master's voice". Engels's declare to acceptance is bolstered via an excellent contribution within the 1840s to the very foundations of the Marxian firm, a contribution entailing not just the "vision" yet many of the development blocks within the understanding of that imaginative and prescient.

Additional resources for Communism’s Collapse, Democracy’s Demise?: The Cultural Context and Consequences of the East German Revolution

Example text

Despite the repressive excesses of Stalinism, socialism was not yet a dead letter, but to be credible as a legitimating ideology, it had to deliver the material and symbolic goods. By permitting the perfection of the state socialist economy and forcing a resolution, albeit imperfect, of the German national identity crisis, the Wall provided the means for the regime to deliver. As long as citizens could opt out of the East German economic and political systems, the SED regime had little chance of consolidating its hold over society.

With 88 per cent of industrial production already in state, or rather 'people's' ownership (VEBs), agriculture, still 70 per cent private, became . the chief target of the new campaign. In the first three months of 1960 alone, more than half a million farmers 'voluntarily' joined cooperative farms (LPGs) as the 14 Bezirke (created in 1952 to replace the federal Lander) competed to be the first to announce total collectivisation (Weber, 1990: 87). At the same time, private artisans faced somewhat less effective pressure to join or form cooperatives (PGHs) while much of remaining private industry and retail came under partial state ownership or other control arrangements (cf.

In this chapter I shall attempt to evaluate some of the more popular of the numerous journalistic and scholarly explanations of communism's collapse in the GDR. Relying in part on the results of my survey of ordinary East Germans, I shall argue that some of the common explanations point to necessary causes of communism's collapse but in the end fail to identify the sufficient causes of the popular mobilisation that brought down the regime. REUNIFICATION AND THE REVOLUTION A common mistake in the historiography of revolutions is the confusion of outcomes with causes.